Bruce Springsteen slams CBS a– kissing in | TV Shows

Bruce Springsteen had a scathing message for President Donald Trump and Stephen Colbert’s soon-to-be former bosses at CBS during The Late Show’s penultimate episode.

On Thursday, May 21, Colbert, 62, wraps up his 11-year run on the CBS late-night show, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, following the community’s July announcement of its cancellation, attributed to financial causes. CBS guarantees the “extended” finale to run past the standard one-hour slot. The actual size of the episode and the names of its company have yet to be announced.

However, Colbert has already welcomed more than a few well-known faces to his show during its ultimate week, including David Letterman and Jon Stewart. So far, the 76-year-old rock star has been one of the most outspoken company, bravely bashing CBS and Trump while weighing in on Colbert’s axing forward of his live efficiency during the Wednesday, May 20, episode.

“I am here tonight in support of Stephen, because you’re the first guy in America who’s lost his show because we’ve got a president who can’t take a joke,” Springsteen said.

“And because Larry and David Ellison feel the need to kiss his a– to get what they want. Stephen, these are small-minded people who’ve got no idea what the freedoms of this beautiful country are supposed to be about. This is for you.”

Springsteen then carried out an acoustic model of his protest music Streets of Minneapolis, which he wrote in the wake of the deadly shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal ICE brokers.

CBS announced the cancellation of The Late Show in July last yr, three days after Colbert publicly criticized Paramount, the community’s mum or dad company, for agreeing to pay Trump $16 million to settle a lawsuit over the modifying of 60 Minutes’ interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris forward of the 2024 election.

The settlement got here as Paramount sought approval for its merger with Skydance, whose proprietor is David Ellison, the son of billionaire and Trump donor Larry Ellison.

“I believe this kind of complicated financial settlement with a sitting government official has a technical name in legal circles: it’s big, fat bribe,” Colbert said in a monologue following the settlement.

He argued that Paramount’s house owners needed the Trump administration’s approval to promote CBS to Skydance. The Paramount-Skydance merger was later authorised and finalized in August 2025.

Meanwhile, CBS said the cancellation of The Late Show was “purely a financial decision” and unrelated to its efficiency or content. The show debuted in 1993, with David Letterman serving as host until Colbert took over in 2015.

Ahead of the finale, Colbert spoke to People about hypothesis on the politics behind his show’s cancellation. He said he had “no fear” of the Trump administration.

He added, “I mean, how silly would it be? The ending of the show aside, which people can speculate about all they want, and I can’t argue with their speculations, but we’re clowns. How much does it diminish the office of the Presidency to even notice what we say?”

Trump has attacked Colbert a number of occasions. After CBS axed the show last yr, Trump weighed in on Truth Social, sharing a scathing message to the host.

The president wrote, “Everybody is saying that I was solely responsible for the firing of Stephen Colbert from CBS’s Late Night. That is not true!

“The motive he was fired was a pure lack of TALENT, and the fact that this deficiency was costing CBS $50 Million Dollars a yr in losses — And it was only going to get WORSE!”

In 2024, Trump called Colbert a “full and complete loser,” saying “CBS ought to terminate his contract and choose nearly anybody, proper off the road, who would do better, and for FAR LESS MONEY.”

He claimed Colbert was “not humorous…not smart” and “VERY BORING” and that his show was “dying from a full lack of viewers.”

Meanwhile, Springsteen has frequently attacked the 79-year-old president. He slammed the “corrupt, incompetent, racist, reckless, and treasonous” Trump administration on stage in Minneapolis during the opening night of his Land of Hope and Dreams tour last month.

Trump clapped back, saying the music icon looks like a “dried up prune who has suffered enormously from the work of a actually unhealthy plastic surgeon” and suffers from a “horrible and incurable case of Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

Ahead of The Late Show’s finale, Colbert reflected on his time as host while maintaining an optimistic outlook. He suggested the show’s ending could be a blessing in disguise.

“I attempted never to take for granted filming in the Ed Sullivan Broadway theater, having that large viewers, or being able to work with the funniest people I do know every day and make jokes about the issues that make me most anxious,” he told People.

He contemplated whether or not CBS “saved my life” because “it takes a lot of bone marrow to do the show every day, and now I’ll be stepping down with enough time, enough power to do other issues that I need to do.”

Colbert has become an empty nester, as his three grown children — Madeleine, 30, Peter, 28, and John, 24, whom he shares with his wife of 32 years, Evelyn McGee Colbert — have all left home.